December 9- House Warming Party

We had a house warming party, also known as a "selamatan" in the national language. Usually the party is held outside if a large amount of people are expected. People usually rent tents and chairs for the event. The leader in our community already had chairs that we were able to use for the festivity. We had close to 90 people come. The interesting thing is that the men and women come in separately, sit separately, and leave separately so I still don't know who belongs with who or who most of our neighbors are. The leader of our community gave a brief introduction speech then Nathan spoke briefly. The rest of the time was spent eating. The whole event only lasted about an hour. It took us all day to prepare and we were exhausted by the end of the day.
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Nora making her way outside. She had a late nap, so she didn't want to go to sleep during the event. Naomi had already fallen asleep because she didn't get a nap.

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Some of the neighborhood kids...but not all of them.

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Some of the neighborhood women.

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Some of the neighborhood men.

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Nathan and our community leader.